Hello, Please find below my revised proposal for the devroom. I will submit it late tonight (sorry for the delay in sending it to the list — I'm currently on the road).
Some notes on what I did: - primarily minor changes to wording - updated number of packages (> 380) from Free Software Directory - updated contact details - added GNU Guix as an example of an infrastructure package - changed (expanded) final paragraph The text is largely a derivate of José's original. Let me know any thoughts or reservations you may have. After submitting the proposal I will formulate a first invitation for talks, as a heads up, to be distributed amongst GNU projects before the publication by FOSDEM of the list of accepted devrooms. Best wishes, Alex 2 Devroom name. ================ GNU. 3 Devroom description: ======================= The GNU Project is a long-standing community of maintainers, developers, translators, webmasters and document writers whose primary task is the development of the free GNU Operating System. The GNU Project maintains and develops a broad set of over 380 programs and libraries. This growing set ranges from system libraries and compilers to video games, desktop environments and business support tools. A development room at FOSDEM would serve 2 main purposes: The primary motivation for most people working on the GNU Project is philosophical (i.e. the ethical considerations that drive the Free Software movement); but technical excellence is a necessity for the maintenance of an operating system composed of hundreds of independent packages maintained in a largely decentralised fashion. GNU programs must feature a high degree of cohesion in order to work properly together. On a theoretical level, the GNU Coding Standards and the GNU Maintainers Guide define some practices and guidelines that guide development to achieve this needed level cohesion. Many of the guidelines laid down in those documents are implemented and provided through GNU infrastructure packages like autotools, gnulib, Guile and Guix. The GNU devroom aims to share new developments in, and to promote the discussion of the guidelines themselves and the packages implementing them. Maintainers of some of the infrastructure packages are expected to attend the event and to organize activities in the devroom. The second goal of this devroom is to strengthen and build the vibrant community of GNU maintainers and developers. Experience gained through the organization of our GNU Hackers Meetings (please see URLs below for information on and videos of past GHMs) shows how useful and fruitful getting diverse hackers meeting face to face can be. In addition, we have found that these kinds of encounters can be invaluable for new hackers interested in wanting to contribute to the GNU project, and thus Free Software in general. At the GNU devroom they will be able to share experiences directly with experienced GNU maintainers, fellow 'newbies' also starting out on this exciting journey and many other interested developers. We hope to provide everyone with a good picture of how we work and organize ourselves. 4 Related URLs =============== - GNU Project: [http://www.gnu.org] - Last GNU Hacker Meeting: [http://www.gnu.org/ghm/2013/paris/] 5 Responsible for the devroom ============================== - Name: Alex Sassmannshausen - Email: [email protected] 6 Preferred day. ================= No preference, but see the Comments/remarks. 7 Comments/remarks. ==================== Some major GNU projects may have dedicated devrooms. It would be interesting to schedule the GNU devroom in such a way that it won't collide with any other GNU project devroom. This would allow the maintainers and developers of all GNU projects to contribute in the GNU devroom.
